Eduardo Chadwick, a top winemaker of Chile.

Proof in the bottle

Convinced of his wines' quality, in 2004 Chadwick organized what have come to be known as "The Berlin Tasting". Sommeliers, wine critics and other professionals compared his wines "blind" with the best of Bordeaux and Tuscany.

The big surprise: his Vinedo Chadwick 2000 and Sena 2001 were ranked first and second over the revered First Growths and Super Tuscans on the table.

"I would have been happy to place a wine in the top five," he says today. "So even I was shocked."

But the case still had to be made for the aging potential of Chile's wines. In 2011, in another blind-tasting format, Chadwick presented 10 years of his wines in a series of vertical tastings (2001 vs 2001, 2002 vs 2002, etc) in Asia. Experts in Hong Kong, Taipei and Seoul consistently ranked Sena as their favorite. Over the next year, he got similar results at blind tastings in London, Zurich, Moscow and five key Chinese cities.

"The professionals can detect wines like the five top Bordeaux in a blind test and some will instinctively be influenced by that recognition," he says. "But the general wine lovers always gave us the highest marks."

Value for money

In the global market, Chadwick says Chile's wines overall continue to have a reputation for being "not expensive and easy to drink". While free-trade agreements have made Chile's wines very price-competitive around the world, winemaker Chadwick and Ambassador Heine agree that hasn't been a bad thing.

Whether you are buying a "table wine" or a mid-range wine or a premium wine, Chadwick says, his country's wines are recognized as good value for money. "That creates interest in Chilean wines, and then people discover that Chile's finest wines are produced to equal standards with Bordeaux."

Addressing the question of matching wines with Chinese food, Heine says your personal taste should always be your first guide.

"Let me tell you a story," he says. "One of our former presidents, Salvador Allende, was a great gourmet and a bit of a dandy. He loved seafood, especially oysters, and he always ate oysters with red wine.

"That shocked his wine-loving friends," Heine says, "and they often asked the president how he could do that.

"It's no problem," he quotes Allende as saying. "The oysters do not know that I am drinking red wine with them."

Contact the writer at michaelpeters@chinadaily.com.cn